DASH4? or is it DASH5?

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Because I did not do a DASH entry yesterday (Thursday) on Day 4, do I call this entry DASH5, because it is Day 5 with Dash OR do I call it DASH4 because it is the 4th entry in the Dashnyam Chronicles?

Did that sentence really need to have the word 'because' three times??

Last back-track a bit to yesterday for a short overview of Day 4 with Dash. Yesterday I drove him to school, spent an hour talking to attendance officers and parent support people. They were all very kind and helpful. I was armed with phone numbers and a calendar with all the odd days that school starts/ends at different times that normal or there is no school. And there are LOTS of those days!!

I finally got my google calendar loaded up with all the new info and deleted all my old times and plans for our school. They will be re-planned this weekend.

Paul stopped by our house waiting for time to take the bus home (A friend from Grover Beach that takes classes down here and rides the bus). Gavin walked Dashnyam home. The boys relaxed, D did a little homework, we went to church, came home, Dash forgot to finish his homework until 10PM, so he was up kinda late.


NOW for DAY 5....
I guess I should call this entry DASH4&5. or DASH 4/5.

I woke, very unwillingly, at 7:14 and got to Dashnyam's room around 7:17. He was still sleep. I thought he didn't understand how to turn on his alarm clock, but Gavin to old me he did have it on, but when it went off at 7AM, Dashnyam turned it off and went back to bed. He was tired from staying up late to finish his homework. I'll have to give him more notice of when we have things planned in the evenings so he can get his homework done around our schedule..

I sent all 3 of my boys out to walk Dashnyam to school with giving Gavin specific instructions of timing how long it takes. They left the house at 8:10 and said it took 13 minutes to get Dashnyam to the corner. It's about a 3-4 minute walk for Dashnyam to get all the way to his class. So we'll plan on a 20 minute walk,to account for waiting on the light and cars to cross streets. Ki said they lucked out with the street crossing today and didn;t have to wait to cross any streets.

I made chai. I discovered that those bulk, Mexican, inexpensive cinnamon sticks are CHEAP for a reason.. they are cheap cinnamon! The whole entire bag has no cinnamon smell, the sticks broken have no yummy cinnamon scent and I licked one and it didn't taste like cinnamon at all. So I added extra clove and anise to my chai. but it's not as good as with the cinnamon. That'll teach me to buy cheap spices!

10:00 - Gavin is learning Japanese, Ki is doing laundry, and Connor is cooking a PVC pipe in the oven. The leather hardening didn't work well yesterday. They will try again after gathering more information.
They are working on weapons for Feast of Mars (Amtgard camp). Connor seems to have finished and socked his weapon today. i has something planned. I need to sew some sashes.


One of Dash's teachers emailed me today, in response to one I sent her, just checking on how he is understanding and going in the class, since he had told me he was a little confused. Sounds like things are going well. He took a reading placement test today to make sure he is in the class he needs to be or if he needs to be moved.

I wonder if I can get Brian to take the 4 boys to church tonight and leave me at home.

May Term Day 2 (The Carrot)

Today is Tuesday. It is a day of lower expectations in the area of schoolwork. Tuesday is the day I ride my bike to Morning Bible Study. The boys are on their own from 8:30-noon. Ki just doesn't get much done on his own. I try to leave him things that involve simple fill ins or watching informative videos. Today, I left him some reading and note taking for Mythology & working on his Lapbook (FAIL). But he did read in his "reading time" book. He did try to the mythology, but got confused and couldn't get the one Power Point to work. He did read some of it and look at some of the pages online I had for him.

When I got home I helped him with getting the Power Point presentation to work, so he watched that. I have learned what I can reasonable expect from his "Solo Days" and to assign work accordingly. I didn't assign very 'accordingly' today. That's Life. Tomorrow we have 2 hours for Mythology Class and we'll work hard.

Due to the plethora of rain we've experienced, I was a bit out of Bike Riding Practice. The ride to church and back felt extra, extra long. I will be extra, extra tired during Ninja Class tonight.

After Lunch we had Sketchers 101 Class. We read about/took notes on Picasso and Cubism, looked at some of the more famous Cubist Pictures, and then I taught them a few more techniques from their drawing kit booklet. After they practiced the new techniques as instructed, in a similar manner as the example, they then had an assignment to draw a picture using 3-4 techniques of their choice (from all they have learned).

I picked a carrot today. It was a 'baby carrot' so I had planted it in a somewhat shallow container. It was the mutant of the baby carrots and grew bigger than the soil depth.

Ki's TUESDAY SCHOOL for this week in MAY TERM

TUESDAY: May 4th

SOTW (3T)

MYTHOLOGY:

Ki- go to & watch the Power Point Story Greek & Roman Mythology (Powerpoint)

READ: http://www.desy.de/gna/interpedia/greek_myth/creation.html

READ the Creation Account in 1^st Genesis.

List similarities. List Differences. (on notebook paper with legible writing. Turn paper in to your Turn In folder)

LAPBOOK WORK: look at this page: http://greece.mrdonn.org/greekgods/index.html

Make a section in your lapbook that lists the Roams gods with their Greek god names.

You might like looking at this page about the family tree: http://www.desy.de/gna/interpedia/greek_myth/godsFT.html

READ: 40 minutes in your reading book.

GAUGED

that is what the last couple weeks have been.
I already know Gavin can do whatever I give him.
But the other two- I know they can get more work done with me sitting right there and doing it with them the whole time and telling them exactly when to do what- they can do more that way then they can independently. and that is fine. they are young. I don't expect them to do the same amunt of math problems and criticial thinking work on their own.
The trick is finding out how much I can expect them to do without out expecting the same as when I'm there guiding their every step and without expecting too little.

Gavin can do the same amount, but Gavin has been pretty independent the last few years (amaxing for a teenage boy about whom the psych said "WOW, he has ADD bad, doesn't he!")

We tried this 2 yrs ago (beginning of the school year- so about2.5 yrs)

Gavin did pretty well, just daily reminders to check his list and work on things.
Connor tried. (was 10 at the time)- but he just could not handle doing much without me there, basically holding his hand.
I didn;t even bother trying with Ki (8)

Now- Gavin(14) is doing great- no reminders needed at all.

Connor (13) is doing fairly well, he just gets distracted easily, so I have to remind him to stay on task sometimes.

Ki (11) - well, all he can handle is his daily RED and then making a list of his GREEN work and I get him going for each item and often sit with him and help him still.

But I am seeing what the younger two can handle well without having too much or too little.

which changes every few months it seems- with those 2...LOL.

The Green & the Red

We wil be employing the Green/Red Weekly Chart once again. It seems to end up being 'busy work' , but it's what they boys asked for and I figure it's time for a deviation from what we've been doing the past 5 weeks. We wil still start our school days with story reading ( read to them) and Brain Gym and prayer.

Ki asked for a blank page to fill in what he wants to do daily to go along with his weekly chart.
For Example: If his GREEN WORK (go at his own pace, due Saturday) lists 10 Brain Quests, Explode the Code pages 9-15, Finish Cart Frog Power Point, Froggy Fractions page 48-51 and his Red Work (do daily) is Read 30 minutes, Write 15 minutes, Play 5 Beat the Clock games (Times Table Drills)
Then he wants a sepreate page so he can make a schedule as he sees fit: for example he may do:
Tuesday
__ Read 30 minutes
__Write 15 minutes
__ 5 Beat the Clocks
__ 4 Brain Quests
__ Explode the Code pages 9, 10, 11
__ Froggy Fractions page 48


Wednesday
__ Read 30 minutes
__Write 15 minutes
__ 5 Beat the Clocks
__ 4 Brain Quests
__ Explode the Code pages 12, 13, 14
__ Power Point (30 minutes)

Thursday
__ Read 30 minutes
__Write 15 minutes
__ 5 Beat the Clocks
__ 2 Brain Quests
__ Explode the Code pages 15
__Froggy Fractions page 49, 1/2 of 50
__Power Point 30 minutes

Friday
__ Read 30 minutes
__Write 15 minutes
__ 5 Beat the Clocks
__ Froggy Fractions pages 50, 51
__ Finish Power Point

Basically He will write down what he wants to do each day from his list and I will remind him throughout each day to check his list (per his request). Gavin and Connor did fine without much of a reminder.

we have today off (Gov't Holiday).

GREEN WORK is written in green ink on a piece of notebook paper, RED WORK is written in Red ink.
I also write reminders for who has cat little duty and what days to shower. I got tired of telling them to shower daily or on their day so this is much easier. The read their lists and do their stuff.

Ki is still not getting work done...

and that is Ok.
at least for this week. I told them they had the whole week to be in charge and do their school on their own. But I am biting my tongue with Ki. here's today's journal:

My husband had a snow delay at work. He didn’t have to be at work till 10. We don’t do school while Brian is here.

Gavin and I used the juicer for breakfast. Gavin did some online research on commercials. He’s always been curious how exactly game shows get their money they give away. So he is researching that today.

We did Story of the World and some Brain Gym activities. After that we talked about their school plans. Just a review of their daily work and had them go through to see what else they needed to do this week. I asked Ki what he wanted to do today from his list and asked if he wanted to make a list for today. He really liked that idea and had me write a list for him.
Brain Quest
‘beat the clock’/Froggy fractions
Reading
Explode the Code
Writing.

We did Brain Quest and then he checked it off. He likes choosing from options and making a list/schedule from his choices. He’s been designing his school days like this since he was in 1st grade. His first 2-3 yrs of homeschooling was almost ALL him deciding what he was doing when, from a list . He has always done much better when h e he can choose and schedule things himself. The last couple years we go back and forth or do a mixture.

Gavin and Connor both decided to do their Spectrum Writing. They have 4 pages due on Friday. Ki moved onto his math. First he decided to do some occupational therapy and he has seen how much easier math is when he does it.

I’m starting to enjoy when people ask me what curriculum we use.

Gavin and Connor are doing an activity with the science kit. (“CSI” DNA activities)

Gavin and Connor were running through the house. So they have to “drop and give me 20” push ups. Gavin did 30 ‘girl push ups’. In sets of 6. He has very weak arms.

The boys played Game Stories at lunch. It’s like all 3 telling a story together- building off each other, etc and threis one person in charge of the story that gives directions, tells them the consequences- what happened when Gavin went around the hill while running from the mech, what happened to Connor when he ejected? (Ki is often the “game master”)

Once again, the older two worked hard on their green work and forgot to complete their red work before they turned on TV.

Ki is still having problems. I think he needs to me to make a schedule and he can just fill in which topic he wants to do in the time slots.

He made a YUMMY dinner though!

Crepes & Battletech

here is my log of DAY 1 of the weekly chart:
Ki made his crepes this morning. Yummy!

Connor started on his independent work list after breakfast. Ki took a shower, so I had to wait to do “teacher-led morning school”

I read out of Story of the World, did a little Brain Gym, wrote the spelling words on the board, and went over the way the weekly charts will work and the different things thay have to do. And showed them where some of the stuff is. I have Ki doing Explode the Code, so gave him that workbook. And the older two have copied pages from a Spectrum writing 7th grade book to do. And I explained the Brain Quest.

Ki says he’ll try to his math for the whole week all today. Gavin and Connor are doing their weeks worth of Brain Quest all day.

I told them if they get their stuff done like they are supposed to we will continue the weekly charts, but if they don’t do well, we’ll have too go back to day by day schedule (not that we were all that scheduled/structured in the first place) They are excited to have so much control over the school. I will have a lot of time on my hands. I guess I can get the house cleaned and exercise.

I want to get some files and notebooks organized to make it easier for them to get their work and turn it in to me.

The day went well. Connor has his computer math done for the week. He just has a couple simple worksheets in math. And G&C have their Brain Quest done for the day.
I wonder if I didn’t give them enough. But they still do reading/writing and a bit of math daily. It’ll be fine.

Ki made scones and cucumber sandwiches for our English Tea lunch.

Ki hasn’t done much. Connor got on the computer before his daily work was done.
Ki made crepes, whipped cream, scones, and cucumber sandwiches. So that did take up a lot of his time.

Not sure what to do about Connor. It’s a simple rule. “You can get on the computer when your daily work is done”- daily work is Read, write for 20 minutes, play 2 math games that are 60 seconds each. I think just “no more computer for him today” We had a new, different schedule today and it takes a couple days to get adjusted.

Connor got so busy doing his Green Work (go at your own pace-have done by Friday) that he forgot his daily work.
I played Battletech for TWO HOURS with Gavin. My brain is so tired! I was told it would barely take an hour--tops! too many numbers for my brain. Every move has about 5 different die rolls and you have calculate difference each time for heat or damage or ability. It is Gavin's MOST FAVORITE thing in the world though.